As a lawyer and politician I believe in our personal ambitions we are individualists. But in our seeking for economic, education, social and political progress as a nation, we all go up or else all go down as one people.

Andy Yong: Government and Bar Council should hold dialogue on proposed amendments to LPA 1976

Gerakan Andy Yong has voiced his support for Minister in the Prime Minister Department, Azalina Othman who warned against foreign parties not to intervene in local affairs after the Australian Bar Association (ABA) and the relevant professional bodies originating in England, Wales as well as Germany denounced the proposed amendments to Malaysia’s Legal Profession Act (LPA) 1976.

Andy Yong echoed Azalina’s statement that foreign parties should refrain from interfering in Malaysia’s legal affairs as it is an intrusion of sovereignty and lack of respect towards Malaysia as a country.

“However, it is imperative that the government takes heed of increasing public concern over the proposed amendments to the LPA 1976, which is seen as unnecessary governmental interference to Malaysian Bar’s affairs affecting the independence of the statutory body. Government should reconsider the proposed amendments to LPA 1976, a serious dialogue session must take place between the Bar Council and the government or Azalina regarding the proposed amendments to LPA 1976 in order to clear the air,” said Andy Yong.

Andy Yong who is a practicing lawyer and member of the Bar Council stressed that it is important that the Bar Council remains independent and more importantly being seen as independent by the people. He was supportive of the only amendment proposed in the Bill in relation to direct election of office bearers at the AGM of the Bar Council and at the State Bar in the spirit of greater transparency and true democracy. He also defended that members of the Bar Council are professional, mature, well-informed which makes the argument of no experience does not carry weight.